Disclaimer: The ideas and concepts used in BLEACH belong to Tite Kubo, as well as any regular characters. Most of the characters in this story belong to me. Thank you.
Suichi's fight still wasn't over. The guards still alive and uncut were continuing their charge at him, unrelenting no matter what. However, a herd of unnamed soldiers charging at an assassin wielding a released sword was still a one-sided battle. Suichi just had to jump back and forth, hopping from side to side and swinging his chain like a horizontal pendulum. The group swayed with him, though not of their own vocation, as the chain was sturdy enough to carry anyone who got caught into the bordering houses.
"Come on!" Suichi taunted. "I'm getting bored!"
"Kill him!" one man shouted. He was caught by the chain and slammed into a house while everyone else continued to duck and dodge.
"Rush him!" another one shouted. As Suichi observed the guards patterns, he decided to switch up his strategy and now swung his chain up and down as well, making a whipping wave motion. With the sudden change, almost all the charging soldiers were taken down, either falling straight to the ground or getting snared by the whip and tossed around a good bit.
"Is it time to give up yet?" Suichi asked the enemies. "I'm getting bored!"
"Men, fall back!" The impromptu leader shouted. With a flash, the conscious four warriors retreated and sheathed their swords.
"Prepare for kido attack on my command!" the actual leader said, barely standing behind them from Suichi's earlier assault. The four well fighters lifted up their arms, opened their palms, and held their extended forearms with their other hand. "Ready!" he commanded, and they started gathering energy into small, green orbs. "Aim!" and they aimed, although Suichi had no intention of staying in one place.
"Suzumebachishuriken!" The casters incanted quickly.
"Kieuseru!" Suichi incanted as well. Suichi vanished and three sharply-pointed cones of green energy blew through the street with deep green smoke trailing behind. Suichi wound up behind the line from his super spiritually-enhanced flash step across the air. His spell was less taxing then that of his adversaries, as his was just a hop over them. "Failure!" Suichi shouted. The guards were quick and drew out their swords to charge him. Suichi welcomed them in and blocked all four of them from the flash-step slashes.
"We'll see you fails!" one of the guards cockily snarled. Suichi kicked him in the gut, just under the ribs, and forced the wind from his lungs. Now only three swords on him, Suichi acted. First, he flexed his arm which made his chain wrap around the disarmed sword and snared it. Then, the chain caught the other swords and spaced them out. Suichi extended his chain behind him and glared up.
"Flail, you say?" Suichi said, purposely saying 'flail' rather than 'fail'. He took a step forward and shot his chain out just past the men that were lined up. Once the swords came by, two guards were severely cut at the throat and the other got cut to the bone at his arm, which he threw up to block with. "Reload!" Suichi shouted, and the swords dislodges from his grip and into the bodies of his fallen foes. The winded guard remained, but his sword was firmly stuck in the back of his comrade.
"No..." he groaned. "We can't die yet..."
"Why not?" Suichi asked. He loomed over the young, scared man like an obelisk, staring ahead rather than down with total apathy for his own slaughter.
"Don't be so high and mighty" the leader proper groaned, clutching his side in pain. "Do you even know what their spell did!?" He pointed skyward, where four streaks of thick green smoke were curving around and the flying bullets from earlier were still aimed at Suichi.
"Huh" Suichi noted. "Never seen anything like that before. Oh well. Once they go into the ground, I'll be fine."
"No you won't!" the winded young one said, still trying to catch his breath. "If they hit anything other than their intended target, they explode into a cloud of smaller darts that re-target you and hunt you down!"
"Oh" Suichi said. "Well, I can see how that could be a problem..." So Suichi stood his ground and waited for the darts to come with the completely unintended intent to slice them down with his own kido-enhanced cutting edge.
I've gone mad, apparently he told himself. I'm not Shin, and I'm not Hoji. I'm an assassin! I can't deflect or block when I could otherwise dodge! Perhaps if I use my Amatsumamori spell, the bullets will just impact and veer away...but now there's no time! The arrows came spiraling closer, so Suichi closed hi eyes and let his body take control. It didn't respond, so his sword instead took over.
Deep within the psyche of Suichi, the master assassin, lurked a monster. Bound in chains like a cocooned insect on the verge of metamorphosis was the personification of Suichi's very power. Haganerensa's true spirit, a maniacal power that screeched and roared out its hissed commands to the outside world. With a limp mind and arm, Suichi's chain whipped up, coiled around each speeding bullet individually, and lassoed them all at once. Then, using the kinetic force they generated in free-flight, Suichi let go of his ground and started spinning wildly around.
"I'll redirect them!" Suichi shouted. He poured his spiritual energy into his chain which traveled through each link and absorbed into the magic bullets. Still spinning with the bullets in a wide circle, he formed his next idea. "Seek out General Ken Yaburashiji!!!" And so he let go of the bullet,s faithful in their programing and settled hard on the ground to stop spinning. His chain neatly coiled back into his hand and turned back into a sword which he sheathed and, without another word to the survivors, flashed away.
I hope to hell and back that worked he told himself, kicking and stepping from building to building to reconnoiter with Shin. Suddenly, a pitch black sensation of monumental pressure engulfed Suichi, and even his thoughts were crushed as he went unconsciously to the ground...
Meanwhile, as Suichi fought to the last, Hoji was lamenting the shortness of his life in the tower where Norbel stood over him. His battle was won, he knew, as Hoji lie defenseless and dying on the ground, unable to move or speak or even blink.
"Ah, Mr. Hoji" Norbel began. "You put up a good fight, but your hubris was far too much for your own good. If you has spent half as much time training your mind as you did your silly, useless techniques like spitting and tree climbing, you may have faired better. But, alas, you are now dead." Hoji was still conscious, and internally seethed at his high and mighty jackass of an enemy. If he left Norbel in this situation he wouldn't gloat, he'd just leave.
"Oh, and another thing!" Norbel continued. "You still haven't feld the tower with my handsome face! You promised me that would happen before the fight was over...strange how that worked out..."
I get it Hoji growled to himself. You won, so just leave it at that and go...I at least put up a good fight. Shin would have liked to watch it, I'm sure. Even down to my last breath I kept up the good fight. Of course, I still lost, but right now I'm learning a little something. Self-confidence is a good thing, but having too much ego can lead to rapid decompression which can destroy a whole village if left unchecked...wait...crap, the blood loss is making my mind wander. I'm even seeing things.
"Seeing what?" a womanly, ethereal voice asked.
Those clouds look like death Hoji unwittingly answered, staring up at the skull-shaped storm clouds.
"Now there's something you don't see every day" Norbel pointed out. "Even the clouds are laughing at you, a happy chorus of silent, seething skulls." If Hoji's body worked, his eyes would have shot open. He wasn't seeing those clouds himself, they were real! "I'm not sure if the heavens weep for you or are glad for me for killing you! Someone up there must have loved you to let you win the fights you fought before, that's the only explanation I can conjure!"
You said I suck already Hoji thought. Now you're just getting boring.
"Wouldn't it be great to kill him now?" the womanly, detached voice said again. Now that his ego had built up so much from his victory, cutting him down seems like the perfect thing to do!"
You're right Hoji replied. But what can I do? I'm dead...
"Man up, boy!" she growled, now becoming thicker and more real in the air around Hoji's face. "What attitude is that for Hoji Araijin to have!? You don't submit to anyone, even death itself! Stand the hell up NOW!!!" And then, as if by magic of utterly unreasonable explanation, Hoji started moving. First his fingers, which twitched and pushed to get his arms started, then his limbs which continued to struggle until his torso kicked in. Finally, he stood, eyes slowly regaining their lost color with Norbel knowing nothing of it.
"I assume your friends have been dispatched" Norbel cockily said. "It's a shame, really. Going up against the Kyuuhiouto with so much verve and tenacity but nothing to back it up." He then began to turn. "I should give you a proper way out, shouldn't I? Stab you right between the eyes and let you be duuuuuhhh....." He saw that Hoji was standing and glaring him down and his mouth gaped toward the ground. The wind whipped fiercely around him, slicing the grass at his feet and kicking it up in little whirlwinds.
"Now take up your sword!" the voice instructed. Hoji obeyed and held up his sword for Norbel to see, right hand at the hand guard. "Take a firm grip with your other hand!" and so Hoji obeyed, meeting the little-finger ends of his hands together with his left arm overlapping his right. "Now, boy, became a man! Incant the sword and release its power!"
I don't know how! Hoji desperately replied. Already, the energies from him and his inner spirit were intertwining. The wind guided his pressure in and out of the blade he held so oddly. What's my sword's name?
"Why not just ask, boy?" the voice said. A moment of silence passed and Norbel became frustrated. He incanted his sword first into a cloud of knives and prepared to let them fly.
"You truly are a monster!" he shrilled. "Why can't you just stay down and let me be!?"
Fine then... Hoji said grumpily. Knowing his inner sword was, of all things, a woman made him feel slighted. He always assumed it would be a manly reflection of himself and his prowess, or at least something befitting his monstrous style of fighting, but a woman? And then he saw her.
She stood right by him, laying her hands on his. The only fitting word was royal, as she was adorned with ethereally glowing jewels and tiger-stripped fur. Floating scarfs of verdant green silk blew with the wind that kicked up endlessly form her golden, gilded heels. Gold, entwining bracers and bracelets ran the length of her toned arms and a necklace of imperceptibly colored jewels sown into to the shining golden fabric of her regal vestments. A calm and beautiful face with a devious smile and narrow eyes. Flowing hair that streaked with black and radiant silver that held fluttering feathers and billowing dressed silk.
Who are you? Hoji asked. His sword smiled and quietly disappeared into him from behind. She then guided his mouth in the summoning while the wind continued to gust and squall around him like a shield.
"Rip and Tear" both incanted at once,
"TORAKAZE!!!""What now!?" Norbel shouted. The pressure whipped straight upwards from Hoji's shoulders like a hurricane and stirred the already violent skies. A hole emerged in the black storm above where the blue sky shined through like a halo high over Hoji's head! His sword exploded into a flowing light and shone brightly around his forearms. His biceps and triceps suddenly started growing tiger strips of red from his skin and all his other wounds became shallow and painless, resembling a full blood-colored tiger that stood in black pants.
The glowing started to die down and his new weapons were revealed: Gauntlets! Glorious, golden full-armed gloves of metal and pure spirit power. Along the outside bone, a sliver protruded out and ended in a spike at his elbow. The fingers were plate armored with creases that allowed him to move them as he normally would, but they each ended in a fierce claw. All along the metal were stripes of green as well.
Now you know Torakaze said to him in a calming voice, and now you can fight harder than ever before! To this information, the vicious Hoji grinned a wide and eager grin. His low tilted head and shining eyes sent terrible shivers up Norbel's spine, as he knew that smile was for him...
Suzumebachishuriken: Wasp Dart (shuriken means dart, apparently)
Kieuseru: Disappear
Torakaze: Tiger Wind
